Sprint has filed paperwork with the Federal Communications Commission seeking permission to acquire the spectrum licenses held by a company called Cleveland Unlimited Inc.
At issue are 12 licenses that provide PCS coverage across portions of Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. If the transaction is approved, Sprint will gain 10 to 16.4MHz in 56 counties, giving it a total of 129.5MHz of spectrum in the coverage area. Under the terms of the agreement, Sprint would not gain Cleveland Unlimited’s customers. Sprint says the spectrum will help it improve its network, expand deployment of new wireless services, and better meet growing consumer demand for mobile broadband. Sprint operates both CDMA and LTE services in the 1900MHz PCS band.
Sprint recently indicated that it won’t participate in the H Block spectrum auction, set to take place in January. It said it would pursue spectrum in other ways. Purchasing it from other companies is one such way toward bulking up its spectrum holdings.
